


made a tear in time with love like lions

by springofviolets



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Realities, Alternate Timelines, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate version of S7E1, Canon Gay Character, Happy Ending, M/M, Protective Keith (Voltron), Subtitle: Keith Fights Death, this is rated G but don't worry there are kisses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-13 10:13:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16015784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/springofviolets/pseuds/springofviolets
Summary: Didn't you tell Shiro as many times as it takes? Didn't you always mean whatever it takes? Now do it.Keith looks at death. "I'll trade you."





	made a tear in time with love like lions

**Author's Note:**

> \- hey so i heard shiro was gay and binge-watched all of voltron for the first time in a weekend at the end of july, and ever since then i've been obsessed with these two and their ridiculous love. i have a lot of feelings and this is just the beginning!!!!!  
> \- title is from digital daggers - feel like falling.  
> \- thanks to [mercibeaucul](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercibeaucul) & ghost for the cheerleading/beta!

"I'm sorry," Allura says, graciously averting her sad gaze away from where Keith knows he looks pathetic, tears prickling at his eyes, banging on the pod where Shiro rests. "There's truly nothing more I can do."

Through the glass under his hands, Keith watches Shiro. He knows he's breathing, for now, though his chest is still. Keith clenches and unclenches a fist and pushes down the urge to crack open the pod and breathe life back into Shiro himself. The problem isn't air, of course. It's something much more complex.

_I died, Keith._

The words have been echoing in his head ever since Shiro said them.

There's a memory of the starry expanse they were in, and Keith straightens up. If there's any chance of anyone knowing anything that could help, wouldn't it be the one who shared a consciousness with Shiro for months?

Keith turns to his mother. "I need to--to check something that might help Shiro," he tells her. "Can you watch over him for me?"

"Of course. I'll find you if anything changes," Krolia agrees, soft. Despite her relatively new arrival in his life, their time spent in the quantum abyss, the images they had shared, had made it obvious just how much Shiro meant to Keith.

( _"What is he to you?" she had asked. Keith had been silent for a few moments, struggling to find a word for his love that had never been spoken aloud but still consumed him entirely. "Everything," he had eventually, honestly replied_.)

He makes his way quickly up into the lion's cockpit.  Black is quiet, though, as Keith runs his hands lightly over the controls.

Keith tries to remember how it felt before, the endless black void and the bright, shimmering specter of Shiro's soul inside it.  He's never tried this before while they're powered down; it's always been when they're fighting, in times of crisis. Then again, they may not be in active battle right now, but this definitely counts as a crisis.

"Come on," he murmurs to the lion. "Please--for Shiro, he _needs_ you to, come on." Black rumbles around him, and snaps back to attention. He feels her brushing against him in his mind, tinged with distress. Is she whimpering? He grabs onto their connection, closes his eyes and centers himself as everything around him flares white, then black, then white again, and then--

He's back there, in the bottomless violet sky.

And immediately, there's something wrong.

A massive shadow hangs over him. Once he focuses on it, it starts shifting and twisting and constricting in on itself until it seems to solidify into a the vague shape of a person.

"Another? This one inspires quite the devotion." Its voice is monotonous, toneless, and come from every direction. "Still, this little beast can't hold me off much longer, and neither will you."

 _Black?_ Keith thinks.

 _No,_ she replies. Her voice is nearly indistinguishable from the other, but the ferociousness in it makes it unmistakably her. _Death has come for our other Paladin. I have done what I can._

The revelation nearly knocks him over. Shiro's death has been lingering much closer than any of them had realized, and if not for the grace and loyalty of Black, he could have lost Shiro again. For good.

 _Thank you,_ Keith says as her presence fades, and then he faces the other entity. His blade materializes in his hand and he grips it tight.  "I'm not going to let you take Shiro." He surges forward, quickly, but the black mass parts cleanly under the blade, and melds back into itself when he pulls back. Keith growls and goes for another parry, but it happens again.

"You cannot fight me, and you cannot stop me," it says. "You have received many lifetimes together already; you two creatures have been quite spoiled. It's time."

Faltering, Keith says, "Wait, what--lifetimes--what?"

Whether it's by some kind of manipulation done by death's hand, or his own memory unlocking, within an instant he's seen all of them.

*

_One_

Keith is there when Shiro leaves for Kerberos, despite Adam refusing to come, seeing him off with a firm hug. He's there, again, when Shiro returns with the Holts, this time greeting Shiro with a breathless "I missed you. I love you," and their first kiss. The mission went perfectly, and Shiro's trajectory at the Garrison doesn't stop until it's forced to slow down by his own body--well, his own body and the increasing bureaucratic restrictions.

"The Garrison isn't the only way for you to go into space," Keith says, a few years later. It's almost an absent comment, because Keith's focus is on kneading his thumbs into Shiro's arm, his gaze intent. But Keith's been prodding Shiro about this for a while now, and it's said with meaning.

"It'd be the same anywhere, Keith." Shiro leans back when Keith starts working up past his elbow.  The electrostimulation patches he wears do a lot of good, but there's still something to be said for human hands digging and smoothing the muscle. "It's not just the Garrison--nowhere would send me on missions when my limbs no longer work. It's hard enough to get approval now, with this one arm mostly dead."

Keith rolls his eyes. "Stop acting like you've ever been a quitter. Rizavi's family is moving to a private company. And I bet if you asked Sam, the Holts would too, especially since he's already working on that arm for you. _Not_ that I told you about it."

(The arm in question wasn't just a prosthetic -- which had been proposed before, but wouldn't be guaranteed to eliminate the cause of Shiro's disease -- but one that connected entirely to the makeup of his body and released some kind of low-key safe radiation or something to target all the problem cells, or something like that. Keith didn't understand all the details, but the gist of it was: it could stop the spread of the disease, be a cure in addition to a really cool looking prosthetic. Sam had only told Keith, though, because he didn't want to make promises to Shiro too early.)

Shiro huffs a small laugh, but he nods in agreement and smiles at Keith. "You're right. We should think about it."

"I'm _always_ right about believing in how great you are," Keith says, and pulls his hands away from his arm, up to his face, to catch Shiro in a kiss.

*

_Two_

This time, Keith is alone in the desert when Shiro's pod comes crashing to earth. He finds him in the dust, and brings him home. He takes out clothes that have been sitting in drawers too long, and patches up as much of the visible damage as he can. The invisible damage will take longer, but for now Keith curls around Shiro in the bed.

In the morning, Shiro wakes him with a gentle kiss pressed to his lips, slow and almost shy at first, until Keith clings to him. Keith makes them coffee and shows Shiro his wall about the lion. They find Blue, and the Castle of Lions, and they're launched into a fight too soon after Shiro just returned from one.

But they make it through, and they return to Earth. Much of it has been devastated with attacks from Sendak, but the Garrison has managed to keep itself and a few surrounded posts. When they touch down, the other Paladins race to their families.

"Are you going to go--do you need to see--you know?" It's a dumb question, because Keith knows things ended before Shiro ever left the first time, and also because of the thing they've been dancing around with each other, devotion and confessions and a kiss that have all gone unnamed, but he still needs to ask.

Shiro shakes his head, smiling. "The only family _I_ need to worry about is right here," he says. "If anyone else needs to talk to me, they'll find me."

Someone does, later, after they've greeted Iverson and briefed everyone. He's laying on a couch in the officer's lounge, using a program Pidge designed to help him plan simulations for the team.

"I can't believe how much you've changed. Keith's calmer and more sure of himself, it's actually really nice to see, and you both seem happy. You're good for each other," Keith overhears. He cuts a look out of the corner of his eye and sees Adam talking to Shiro. "You always were," Adam says with a small _tsk_. "It just sometimes ended up in trouble. Don't think I don't remember."

"It's different now," Shiro replies. Adam must give him a doubtful look, because Shiro concedes, "Okay, fair, not the trouble part."

Keith wouldn't normally eavesdrop, but it's not like he's hiding. They're right there, he's right here. And, yeah, he's curious.

"I'm just surprised you haven't locked that down yet," is what he hears next.

Shiro does one of his rare, adorable sputters. "I...what--"

Grinning, Keith sits up, raises his voice, and says, "Yeah, me too, Adam."

" _Keith_!" Shiro's cheeks are flushing, one of his favorite sights.

"I'll leave him in your hands," Adam says. He turns to leave the room, but as he reaches the door, he adds, "I'm glad we got a chance to talk again, Shiro," and then he's gone, and the two of them are alone.

Keith brushes Shiro's hand with his fingers, and Shiro looks at him. "The problem is," Shiro says, "I don't know how to begin to name what you mean to me, Keith. What do you call someone who is everything?"

"I'm not sure," Keith replies. He's faced the same, and just called it _my Shiro_. "But boyfriend seems like it could be good start, maybe?"

"A very good one," Shiro agrees, and they both smile through the kiss that comes next.

*

_Three_

It begins with strange, little things that Keith doesn't give much thought. Sometimes, when he leaves Shiro's room, he feels like he's being watched, but puts it down to Lance being nosy. There's an old shirt of Shiro's that he loves to sleep in, on nights he knows he'll get a full night's sleep, anyway, and doesn't stay in his clothes when he climbs into bed--anyway, that shirt has gone missing, too, but maybe the castle is feeling temperamental and ate some laundry.

Nothing is weird enough to really worry about.

Until:

"Thanks, Shiro," Keith says, taking the towel handed to him as he comes out of the training room.

"I'm not Shiro," says the thing that looks just like him.

Keith has a knife to his throat immediately. "Where is he? What did you do to Shiro?" He looks around, like the real Shiro might be hiding around the corner. " _Shiro_!" he yells into the hall.

The not-Shiro puts his hands up, wisely not moving.  From this close, Keith can see how he's all wrong, all of him too newly-bright--the real Shiro shines more like a pearl, natural brilliance made all the more obvious by the sands that try to wear it down. This man has the prosthetic Galra arm, but everything else is flawless, and Keith has kissed too many blemishes and scars, loved every single one of them.

"He's wherever he was before," the imposter replies, too calm. "I didn't do anything. I couldn't."

A door opens and closes, and then they hear: "Keith?"

"Shiro! Over here." He relaxes the knife just slightly, so it's not biting into the skin.

When Shiro catches up with him, his eyes widen. "Okay," he says slowly. "Let's take this out of the hallway and somewhere private." He guides them back in the direction he came from, into what must have been some kind of library, if the walls of old files and books are any indication.

With both of them standing over the not-Shiro, Keith feels it's secure enough to put down his blade. He crosses his arms. "Now, explain. Everything."

He does, willingly, the story spilling out, about how he woke up injured with an old woman nursing him. She told him he was a Paladin of Voltron, and a clone had taken his place when he was captured by the Galra. She would help him escape, she promised him, but he must find the clone and come back to her. The clone would be with the Red Paladin, and he would have to be careful, for the Red Paladin would always be close. If he could, he should use the connection the Red Paladin had to him to bring both of them. It was vital for the safety of the entire universe.

"She gave me a cloaking device," he tells them. "That's how I got on this ship. But then I saw you, and I couldn't." He looks at Keith, his eyes wet. "I saw how you watched him and touched him, and I knew that was the real connection, beyond just bodies...you look at each other like you've seen each other's souls. I knew she had to have lied, and that it wasn't this Shiro who was the clone. I was."

"Yeah, I would know if Shiro had been replaced by a clone," Keith scoffed. Neither of them mentioned how he hadn't noticed, at least for a few moments, just minutes ago.

Shiro heaves a sigh. "I can't say I'm surprised. I thought I heard something about _Operation Kuron_ when I was escaping, but it's sometimes hard to remember what was real and what's just become part of the twisted nightmare." Keith reaches for him, hand squeezing Shiro's shoulder. "Well, we have an advantage now," Shiro says. "Are you on our side?"

Kuron's eyes are focused on where Shiro and Keith touch, and the longing is tangible.

"Yes."

*

_Present_

Keith shakes his head when his vision returns to the field of stars returns. There were an endless amount of lives that flashed in Keith's mind--glimpses of growing up with the Blades, of Sven and an Altean who looked eerily like himself, of a younger Shiro looking up at Keith--but only a few had given him a full story to hold onto.  He pushes everything he's seen back, because he doesn't have time to reel over the details, like how many versions of them were together like he wished they were.

"You see," death says. "The creature has been happy for many lifetimes, and has reached the end of the thread."

"He's not a creature, he's a person!" Keith growls. "And none of those were _this_ Shiro. _This_ Shiro deserves better!"

"There is no such thing as deserving," it says, and that pisses Keith off. He and Shiro haven't been through everything they've been through--across realities, even--for some blob of smoky void to be all smug about fate.

Clutching his blade tighter, Keith considers his options.  As much as he'd like to, he's learned that he can't physically fight something that isn't actually corporeal, so killing it is probably out of the question.

Black told him she couldn't do anymore. What she had managed to do--preserving Shiro's quintessence and then holding off death until he got there--was more than he could have ever asked for, anyway.

Death has no face, but lingers, silent, in a way that makes Keith feel watched.

 _Think_ , Keith says to himself.

He thinks about pulling Shiro from the wreckage of his pod; the first time he saved him by piloting Black; finding him after everyone else had given up, but Keith never had; knowing, after that, that something wasn't right, but not able to confront it, because it meant questioning if Shiro was really with him. He sees himself fighting Shiro, and how even the clone stopped when Keith said those three words; remembers choosing to fall rather than let go of Shiro; the shock of seeing Shiro in the astral plane.  Nothing, nothing had ever stood in Keith's way, and he won't let it now.

_Didn't you tell Shiro as many times as it takes? Didn't you always mean whatever it takes?_

_Now do it._

Keith looks at death. "I'll trade you."

He takes a breath, steeling himself.

"Sixty of your years," it says.

"Oh, uh. Of mine? Okay." That's better than he expected. At least he'd get some time to say goodbye. "Great. Deal. Can you maybe give me an estimate of how long I'd have left?"

Death is shifting again, spreading out and growing more translucent, but its strange voice is still as strong. "Death is a balancing act," says, as if it heard his surprise at the trade. "Sixty years of your life for sixty of the other one's. That is half your lifetime."

It's said so nonchalantly, like it doesn't realize that is an unusual lifespan; then again, it's probably not, not to someone who takes lives without regard for species or universe. The Galra must be longer-lived, and--

If what death said is true, Keith realizes, now he and Shiro will have the same lifespan.

"We will meet each other then," death says, and disappears.

Keith blinks, and he's in Black once more. He races out and back to the makeshift medbay. He needs to see Shiro.

He enters just in time for the glass of the healing pod to roll down, and Shiro opens his eyes and coughs.  He's by Shiro's side in an instant, helping him sit up and then pulling him in for a tight hug, aware he's being obvious in how much he wants to never let go. He's alive, he's whole, and he's going to be with Keith for many, many more years.

"Keith," Shiro says, soft and breathy. "I was dreaming. You saved me."

He wonders if Shiro saw the same things he did, or if he dreamt of something else. There will be time to ask and talk about it--and everything else that just happened--later. For now, he doesn't care who's still around them, because he needs to do this, needs to--

"Always," he tells Shiro. _Not even death could stop me_ , he doesn't say. "As many times as it takes."

And then, because he's been longing to and it's meant to be and there's never been a better time than now, when Shiro is _alive_ and _okay_ , he cups the back of Shiro's head and kisses him.

Shiro makes a startled but pleased sound, and then kisses him back.

Feeling Shiro's hair under his hands and his mouth moving against his own is, he knows for a fact, the best feeling in any universe.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos/comments are loved!
> 
> This story is part of the [LLF Comment Project](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/llfcommentproject) (including the [LLF Comment Builder](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/post/170952243543/now-presenting-the-llf-comment-builder-beta)), which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates feedback, including:
> 
>   * Short comments
>   * Long comments
>   * Questions
>   * “<3” as extra kudos
>   * Reader-reader interaction
> 

> 
> This author responds to comments.
> 
> -
> 
> you can also find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/springofviolets).

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [come alive in slow motion (disembodied remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19141513) by [strangetowns](https://archiveofourown.org/users/strangetowns/pseuds/strangetowns)




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